Balkan Countries : The Path to Nominal (Economic) Convergence

The European integration process presents a challenging objective for Balkan countries. The process has evolved gradually and the Balkan countries actually present a different status in the integration process. EU accession is subject to the Copenhagen criteria fulfillment: economic, political and acquis communautaire. Upon granting the “member state” status, the next step concerns participation in the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and introduction of the single currency. This stage is related to the Maastricht criteria fulfillment or nominal convergence criteria. The main objective of this paper is to assess the nominal convergence of the Balkan countries in terms of price stability exchange rate stability, fiscal criteria and long term interest rate criteria. We will assess how macroeconomic indicators comply with Maastricht criteria requirements as by the end June 2015. Our main finding is that despite not meeting the Maastricht criteria as by the cutoff date, these countries are following the right path toward full effective European integration